


i got soul (im not a soldier)

by stumblebee



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Character Study, F/M, spoilers up to ep 5, the deaths are canonical
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-21
Updated: 2014-04-21
Packaged: 2018-01-20 07:35:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 724
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1502066
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stumblebee/pseuds/stumblebee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He calls her Princess and means Queen. </p><p>(a drabble of a character study, Bellamy and Clarke)</p>
            </blockquote>





	i got soul (im not a soldier)

**Author's Note:**

> based on episodes 1-5, so no doubt it will be ridiculously outdated in about three weeks. also i haven't read the book. also i wrote this in fifteen minutes and read it over maybe once. oh well.
> 
> title from all these things that i've done by the killers which may or may not be Bellamys theme song

* * *

 

 

Bellamy had a plan. Things went wrong. He was wrong. People died.

Bellamy isn’t a murderer.

 

Bellamy is just trying to protect his sister. Bellamy is just trying to protect Charlotte. Bellamy is just trying to make it so ~~98~~ ~~97~~ 94 wild things can survive with each other. Bellamy is just trying not to get himself killed.

Bellamy had a plan and it went something along the lines of “do what must be done”. Bellamy had a plan that began and ended with Octavia. And now they are here and here he is. He has let 300 die. He has watched a twelve year old murderer jump. He has beaten a man halfway to death and sentenced him to finish the job himself. Bellamy isn’t a murderer but an awful lot of people are dying because of him. He doesn’t know.

Bellamy never wanted responsibility, only control. But he got both, and now, he is terrified of the monsters his charges could build, of the destruction they could rend on each other. Bellamy lives in a glass house and sleeps with shit disturbers and rioters.  They teeter on the cliff with Charlotte every day.

Bellamy is angry and afraid and can't show it and Clarke is everything he has hated and feared and left behind. Clarke opposes him. Clarke is the child of the council, Clarke is a product of the machine that killed his mother and took Octavia and Clarke is just and hopeful and Clarke sees what he is and Clarke is not afraid of him.

Clarke isn’t a murderer. She’s tougher. She is merciful. She takes Atom’s life, because he asks her to, because Bellamy can’t. She saves Jasper’s life, because she knows she has to try. Clarke isn’t a murderer but Clarke can take a life and save a life in equal mercy.

Clarke is calm in the storm, Clarke is incredulous in the mob, Clarke is desperate and drowned out by bloodlust. Clarke is hopeful and tough and angry and sad and Clarke fucks up too. Clarke lives in black and white, while Bellamy bathes in shadowy grays. Clarke needs him to balance as much as he needs her.

He calls her Princess and means Queen. Clarke is regal and fair and Clarke is a leader. Idealistic to a fault, yes, but in that she needs Bellamy. Together, his fire tempered by her justice, they can make something of this place. They can make a little world and they can rule it, they can survive.

Bellamy is big and tall and loud and Bellamy had a gun and people listen when Bellamy speaks. Bellamy has made the rules, Bellamy has enforcers and Bellamy has no one. Octavia resents him, Octavia doesn’t trust him, Octavia loves him but blames him. Octavia lived under the floor, Octavia lived in a cage and now that the sky is her only keeper, she is another wild thing and she will not bend to him. Bellamy has devotees and Bellamy has bullies who do what he says and Bellamy has a counterbalance. Without Clarke, they’re all dead. Without Clarke, they are a feral mob, without Clarke 'Lord of the Flies' is days away. Even with Clarke 'Lord of the Flies' could be days away. Without Clarke, Bellamy has brute force and hedonism. Whatever they want, as long as it’s what he wants too. He planned for a dog eat dog world, but the dogs have bigger, unanticipated, problems to deal with. They are an isolated tribe and extinction beckons from glowing woods.

He saved her life once. She stood between him and Octavia’s safety, and he held her life in his hand. Her eyes met his, and she knew it to. She glanced away, searched for a way to save herself, but finding nothing, made steely eye contact. Her life was in her hands and she was in his way but he couldn’t let go. Bellamy isn’t a murderer. Bellamy is not cruel. Bellamy just wants to save his sister. Clarke wants to save them all.

Clarke is alone, too.

Clarke's best friend is dead, Clarke's father is dead, Clarke's mother betrayed her, Clarke's comfort has left her. Clarke needs him and Bellamy can't do this without her.

Together, they would be unbeatable.

He knows it, even if he'd rather not believe it.  

**Author's Note:**

> ziallerina.tumblr.com if ur so inclined


End file.
